The real estate management industry consists of properties with rental tenants that are managed by either the owner or his/her agent, who is located at a different site.
Today's typical rental process consists of the on-site manager taking a credit application written by hand by a prospective tenant, and submitting the application by verbal telephone conversation, by fax, or by a modem to a credit checking agency. The credit agency will then check their data base for information that they have on the applicant and respond within a period of anywhere from one minute to as much as several days, generally by fax or modem, with a credit report on the prospect. If the on-site manager has the authority, they will make a decision based on the credit report results, often after making some auxiliary phone checks on information, whether or not to rent the space to the applicant. Some large organizations assign the credit checking to an off-site person who will communicate by fax or phone. In either case, the decision whether or not to rent to a prospective tenant is somewhat subjective to the extent that it is difficult to evaluate someone's future ability to pay based on their past history. The process is open to charges of discrimination.
The on-site manager will then hand-write leases and other documents necessary for the tenant to move in.
This rental process takes place over a period of up to several days because of the various separate procedures that a rental manager must go through to gain information about the prospective tenant. This time is expensive for the manager and for the property owner who could be getting rent for his space during the period of time consumed by the delay.
Therefore there remains a need to remove some of the subjectivity and improve the objectivity and efficiency of the rental and leasing processes. There also remains a need for system, method, and procedures that integrates and improves upon existing conventional procedures and to save time and money for all the parties.